I guess a lot of people will probably crack anyway though, once it's in the wild. Particularly the ranting GAFers.
Tax returns. Seeing demos of games, videos in person, and the game ons and everything word of mouth related that can be expected here or course too, but I swear Nintendo launches handhelds in the spring because they know that a sudden influx of income for people will cause them to buy the cool new shiny toy that they desire.
Of course there are also things like the release of a new Mario Kart to consider.
All of which is very smart of Nintendo. And the bit about Mario Kart is also very true - Mario Kart DS sold incredibly well. The game was still charting in the NPD top 20 into the first couple months of 2010, which is absolutely fantastic for a game released in 2005. Mario Kart 3DS will be a huge (HUGE!) seller.
Personally, I'm not too worried with the somewhat lackluster launch line-up. Nintendogs + Cats, PES 3D, possibly Pilotwings, plus DSiWare and DS backwards compatibility means that I personally will have plenty to play. Hell, just the DS backwards compatibility will be enough to keep me going on it for awhile.
That is great news on the battery life and not really surprising - Nintendo has pretty much always been conservative on their battery life estimates.
it seems that the consensus is that region locking is up to the publishers...meaning most will likely region lock their games
I asked in the other thread, but wanted to here: seeing as this is the same as it was for the 360, who tends to lock and who tends not to lock on the 360? Are quirky japanese games with no large international market likely to be locked? Do the big puclishers always lock, while the smaller ones perhaps don't?
Looking through the list, I don't see any really noticeable patterns regarding developers, but the Japanese versions tend to be region-locked much more often than the US (or Asian) versions. I'm really, really hoping more developers give up on it.
I don't think battery life on a non-phone portable device has ever mattered to me since the only circumstances where I can't plug the thing in seldom last more than 2 hours.
Who are these people who go on 5 hour commutes every day and must have 3D and WiFi turned on?
I do think Pokémon Black/White will compete with the 3DS coming Spring. Maybe not as clever on that front. But like you say, early adopters will buy the initial 4 million shipment and word of mouth will spread. Enough time for the holiday period.
Slap a works on 3DS sticker on it and watch as people buy it just because there's only 2 nintendo launch titles .
King Riptor on
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Wow, everyone seems to be bitching about the price. Am I the only person who was seriously expecting the price to be even higher then that?
I thought most everyone was shooting for a $250 price tag. I think Pachter was saying something like it being over $9,000 or something but I could be wrong.
Thing is, no one will care about battery life, friends codes, and price when we can finally all bask in the glory of
but with combat!
Even joking about the game being awesome, 3D dinosaurs does have a magical sort of pull to it.
Plus that they have to spell out "Combat of Giants" in a game involving dinosaurs is great.
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mntorankusuI'm not sure how to use this thing....Registered Userregular
edited January 2011
Turning 3D off won't affect battery life as much as you might think.
The parallax barrier is passive and can't actually be turned off. It DOES use extra battery power, as the filter blocks light that needs to be made up for with a brighter backlight, but turning 3D off doesn't change that.
Normally games would only need to render half as many frames in 2D mode, but if Tecmo and Capcom are any indication, developers are going to be using that free GPU time to improve the frame rate or the quality of the graphics. In that case, battery life won't be affected by turning 3D off.
I don't think battery life on a non-phone portable device has ever mattered to me since the only circumstances where I can't plug the thing in seldom last more than 2 hours.
Who are these people who go on 5 hour commutes every day and must have 3D and WiFi turned on?
I don't use it on commutes. Trade shows (not a problem) and plane trips (could be a problem). My netbook does 8 hours. My Zune is the only other portable device I use on a regular basis, and that's usually in my car in the charger. My Kindle doesn't count because that damn thing lasts forever.
Huh. Wonder if Nintendo would be nice enough to sell an extra battery.
EDIT: Huh, they sell DSi and DSi XL batteries. $15 isn't bad.
I'd predict that most companies aren't going to bother adding both 2D and 3D graphics in the same way that loads of games implemented the two screens pretty poorly.
Edit: at least on planes you'll be turning off the wireless because of regulations, so there's a spare five minutes right there
I'd predict that most companies aren't going to bother adding both 2D and 3D graphics in the same way that loads of games implemented the two screens pretty poorly.
Do you mean that most companies won't tweak the game to run better in 2D mode (60 FPS, antialiasing), or that most companies won't support the 3D effect at all?
Because if the game is polygon-based it is incredibly easy to make it 3D - wherever the in-game camera is, you just put a second camera right next to it and interlace the columns of pixels together. Nintendo probably even has functions to handle much of this automatically.
I'd predict that most companies aren't going to bother adding both 2D and 3D graphics in the same way that loads of games implemented the two screens pretty poorly.
Do you mean that most companies won't tweak the game to run better in 2D mode (60 FPS, antialiasing), or that most companies won't support the 3D effect at all?
Because if the game is polygon-based it is incredibly easy to make it 3D - wherever the in-game camera is, you just put a second camera right next to it and interlace the columns of pixels together. Nintendo probably even has functions to handle much of this automatically.
"Actually, if you have the 3D, Wi-Fi and other functions off it's longer than five hours," said Yarnton talking to Eurogamer.
I'm guessing the various times will be similar to DSi. Hopefully this can put all the battery complaints to rest.
so, in addition to being able to turn off those features, the 3DS apparently features a "powersaving mode" (i'm not sure what else it does besides slightly desaturating the graphics). i wonder why nintendo has hardly mentioned it much, or revealed how many minutes/hours it will add to the battery life.
mntorankusuI'm not sure how to use this thing....Registered Userregular
edited January 2011
I wonder if other developers (or even Nintendo) will be able to release "apps" that can run while a game is playing like the web browser and such does? Or if that's a feature reserved just for those system things.
I'd predict that most companies aren't going to bother adding both 2D and 3D graphics in the same way that loads of games implemented the two screens pretty poorly.
Do you mean that most companies won't tweak the game to run better in 2D mode (60 FPS, antialiasing), or that most companies won't support the 3D effect at all?
Because if the game is polygon-based it is incredibly easy to make it 3D - wherever the in-game camera is, you just put a second camera right next to it and interlace the columns of pixels together. Nintendo probably even has functions to handle much of this automatically.
The tweaking. I hope I'm proved wrong, though.
Dead or Alive: Dimensions is actually setting a good precadent there regardless of whatever quality the game itself ends up being.
Apparently it plays at 60 FPS in 2D versus 30 FPS in 3D and looks just fine in both modes.
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SirUltimosDon't talk, Rusty. Just paint.Registered Userregular
edited January 2011
The Dinosaurs game is actually the third or fourth game in a series about giant monsters fighting eachother. I know I've one about dragons and one about giant insects, both on the DS.
I wonder if other developers (or even Nintendo) will be able to release "apps" that can run while a game is playing like the web browser and such does? Or if that's a feature reserved just for those system things.
also hi inthegray
I'd guess you wouldn't see anything like that for awhile from Nintendo. I'm sure they'll retain the ability to do it themselves, but allowing other developers to play with the functionality? Doubtful.
How's the battery power?
The system will take about 3 1/2 hours to charge and then last about three to five hours on a full charge. That's with the 3D effects activated. The company guesses that people who keep the 3D turned off could get as many as eight hours. Turning off the system's wireless via a switch, lowering its brightness settings or even running it in a dimmer power-save mode will all help the machine last longer. The system charges off of a power cord or while sitting in a plugged-in "cradle
The system's power cord seemed kinda short. Should we be worried?
No. Nintendo's Trinen said that the short 3DS cord shown recently in Japan was only "for illustrative purporses only." Power cords from the DSi or DSiXL will also plug into the 3DS.
Once and for all, is the 3DS region-locked? The days of playing Japanese games on a U.S. handheld are over?
For Nintendo, they are. The system is region-locked. "One of the primary driving factors for that has to do with parental controls," Nintendo's Bill Trinen says. "Different regions have different ratings systems. The region-locking allows us to provide the different parental controls to deal with the ratings in each territory." While this seems like a policy change for Nintendo, Trinen says they've been doing this for DSi and Wii games, all of which are linked to their system's parental controls.
I wonder if other developers (or even Nintendo) will be able to release "apps" that can run while a game is playing like the web browser and such does? Or if that's a feature reserved just for those system things.
also hi inthegray
I'd guess you wouldn't see anything like that for awhile from Nintendo. I'm sure they'll retain the ability to do it themselves, but allowing other developers to play with the functionality? Doubtful.
This is far from confirmation, but initial videos of the interface have always pointed out that the top strip of icons is "the" list of things that can be run alongside games. Nothing about the other apps down below being able to run like that.
I wonder if other developers (or even Nintendo) will be able to release "apps" that can run while a game is playing like the web browser and such does? Or if that's a feature reserved just for those system things.
also hi inthegray
I'd guess you wouldn't see anything like that for awhile from Nintendo. I'm sure they'll retain the ability to do it themselves, but allowing other developers to play with the functionality? Doubtful.
This is far from confirmation, but initial videos of the interface have always pointed out that the top strip of icons is "the" list of things that can be run alongside games. Nothing about the other apps down below being able to run like that.
I assumed he was asking if Nintendo or developers could add more of those type of apps in the future. I saw the Kotaku video about the interface.
Yeah, worst excuse ever... the whole region lock thing is probably the only reason I will not buy one straight away.
Living in Germany I'd still have to import stuff from the UK anyway for English language versions and then have the additional restriction and hassle of not being able to play any US or Japan only releases.
Librarian on
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mntorankusuI'm not sure how to use this thing....Registered Userregular
I wonder if other developers (or even Nintendo) will be able to release "apps" that can run while a game is playing like the web browser and such does? Or if that's a feature reserved just for those system things.
also hi inthegray
I'd guess you wouldn't see anything like that for awhile from Nintendo. I'm sure they'll retain the ability to do it themselves, but allowing other developers to play with the functionality? Doubtful.
This is far from confirmation, but initial videos of the interface have always pointed out that the top strip of icons is "the" list of things that can be run alongside games. Nothing about the other apps down below being able to run like that.
Well, that's what I was wondering. Since the Web Browser application isn't going to be included from the start, I thought it might be a thing that downloadable apps can do. Like you could customize those four spots or something. I dunno.
Well, that's certainly not the only reason, but it's the most palatable one to the press / general public.
Another reason being that a company doesn't want to spend a lot of money localizing a game for Europe only to have crap sales because everyone just imported it during the time it took to translate everything.
The whole battery life thing sounds dire at first blush—3 to 5 hours—but then I remembered that's what my iPhone generally gets when I'm using it full-blast. It'll likely last me a full day all said and done, which is okay enough. (I wonder if there will be aftermarket batteries that boost the power; I love the big-ol' battery in my PSP.) What I am interested in hearing more of is how long the 3DS ends up lasting in terms of its sleep and standby modes; the whole StreetPass thing sounds cool, and I'm going to be on a college campus a lot so I'm hoping to at least get some hits, but if keeping it in sleep and StreetPass enabled is going to drain the battery more I fear a lot of people will just keep it off, removing the incentives.
Dead or Alive: Dimensions is actually setting a good precadent there regardless of whatever quality the game itself ends up being.
Apparently it plays at 60 FPS in 2D versus 30 FPS in 3D and looks just fine in both modes.
It does, but I know I would totally take 60 FPS over any 3-D poppery in a heartbeat. In an instance like how SSFIV has that crazy novel Dynamic View mode, I might be more inclined to try the 3-D more, but in the few minutes I got to try DoA, I thought the silky-smooth FPS was well worth sacrificing the 3-D. Horses for courses and all.
It does, but I know I would totally take 60 FPS over any 3-D poppery in a heartbeat. In an instance like how SSFIV has that crazy novel Dynamic View mode, I might be more inclined to try the 3-D more, but in the few minutes I got to try DoA, I thought the silky-smooth FPS was well worth sacrificing the 3-D. Horses for courses and all.
I probably would too, in a fighting game at least, which is why I think it's such a shitty thing for them to do.
"Here, you can either have 3D graphics on your new 3D handheld... or a good frame rate"
The $250 price tag isn't great but worse than that, the launch lineup is pretty devoid of things I want. If I bought a 3DS at launch, it'd probably be just used for DS games mostly anyway the first year, so I probably should just get a cheap DS instead and pick up a 3DS version 2.0 in a couple years when the library is better and the used game bins are full.
Region locking being such a big complaint, even among a vocal minority, seems odd. I guess its mostly because I honestly see it as being such a huge non issue myself though.
Other than weeaboos being upset because they can't listen to J-pop while practicing their Japanese in some niche dating sim or dance rhythm game crammed with annoying anime trappings or people in Europe or Australia wanting to import and save some money (which is actually pretty valid and I do empathize there), I don't see any major blows being dealt.
Turning 3D off won't affect battery life as much as you might think.
The parallax barrier is passive and can't actually be turned off. It DOES use extra battery power, as the filter blocks light that needs to be made up for with a brighter backlight, but turning 3D off doesn't change that.
Normally games would only need to render half as many frames in 2D mode, but if Tecmo and Capcom are any indication, developers are going to be using that free GPU time to improve the frame rate or the quality of the graphics. In that case, battery life won't be affected by turning 3D off.
Yea, I don't get why Nintendo is making the statements that it'll have more battery life in 2D. The CPU and GPU utilization won't be any less (at least in games that improve framerate in 2D mode).
Personally I think it's likely that the non-technical people at Nintendo might not even know the difference, not the first time I've seen people misunderstanding this technology.
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All of which is very smart of Nintendo. And the bit about Mario Kart is also very true - Mario Kart DS sold incredibly well. The game was still charting in the NPD top 20 into the first couple months of 2010, which is absolutely fantastic for a game released in 2005. Mario Kart 3DS will be a huge (HUGE!) seller.
Personally, I'm not too worried with the somewhat lackluster launch line-up. Nintendogs + Cats, PES 3D, possibly Pilotwings, plus DSiWare and DS backwards compatibility means that I personally will have plenty to play. Hell, just the DS backwards compatibility will be enough to keep me going on it for awhile.
That is great news on the battery life and not really surprising - Nintendo has pretty much always been conservative on their battery life estimates.
3DS FC: 0817-3759-2788
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Looking through the list, I don't see any really noticeable patterns regarding developers, but the Japanese versions tend to be region-locked much more often than the US (or Asian) versions. I'm really, really hoping more developers give up on it.
The must have game for everyone will be Combat of Giants: Dinosaurs 3D without question. Why?
Does one really even have to ask? Fuckin' dinosaurs in 3D! Whoo!
In a world . . . where ridiculously bad but nevertheless fuckawesome game ideas imagined from a sampling of sixth grade classes being polled in the mid '90s suddenly have a chance to materialize in the year 2011 and prove the existance of a benevolent God, one game stands alone!
Never. The few who are complaining will continue to do so.
Who are these people who go on 5 hour commutes every day and must have 3D and WiFi turned on?
"Longer than 5 hours = 5.2 hours, NO SALE"
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Slap a works on 3DS sticker on it and watch as people buy it just because there's only 2 nintendo launch titles .
"Excuse while I go play my PSPGo now sir. That's a real handheld."
I thought most everyone was shooting for a $250 price tag. I think Pachter was saying something like it being over $9,000 or something but I could be wrong.
"But I'm going to be playing with 3D games over Wi-Fi, and I play outside so I need maximum brightness! NINTENDOOMED"
Plus that they have to spell out "Combat of Giants" in a game involving dinosaurs is great.
The parallax barrier is passive and can't actually be turned off. It DOES use extra battery power, as the filter blocks light that needs to be made up for with a brighter backlight, but turning 3D off doesn't change that.
Normally games would only need to render half as many frames in 2D mode, but if Tecmo and Capcom are any indication, developers are going to be using that free GPU time to improve the frame rate or the quality of the graphics. In that case, battery life won't be affected by turning 3D off.
I don't use it on commutes. Trade shows (not a problem) and plane trips (could be a problem). My netbook does 8 hours. My Zune is the only other portable device I use on a regular basis, and that's usually in my car in the charger. My Kindle doesn't count because that damn thing lasts forever.
Huh. Wonder if Nintendo would be nice enough to sell an extra battery.
EDIT: Huh, they sell DSi and DSi XL batteries. $15 isn't bad.
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Edit: at least on planes you'll be turning off the wireless because of regulations, so there's a spare five minutes right there
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Do you mean that most companies won't tweak the game to run better in 2D mode (60 FPS, antialiasing), or that most companies won't support the 3D effect at all?
Because if the game is polygon-based it is incredibly easy to make it 3D - wherever the in-game camera is, you just put a second camera right next to it and interlace the columns of pixels together. Nintendo probably even has functions to handle much of this automatically.
It has a serious "enhanced Primal Rage running at 15 FPS and without all the memorable fighters" feel to it.
Which is really kind of a tragedy. A game like this in the right hands could have been really cool.
The tweaking. I hope I'm proved wrong, though.
so, in addition to being able to turn off those features, the 3DS apparently features a "powersaving mode" (i'm not sure what else it does besides slightly desaturating the graphics). i wonder why nintendo has hardly mentioned it much, or revealed how many minutes/hours it will add to the battery life.
also hi inthegray
Dead or Alive: Dimensions is actually setting a good precadent there regardless of whatever quality the game itself ends up being.
Apparently it plays at 60 FPS in 2D versus 30 FPS in 3D and looks just fine in both modes.
I'd guess you wouldn't see anything like that for awhile from Nintendo. I'm sure they'll retain the ability to do it themselves, but allowing other developers to play with the functionality? Doubtful.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/
I write about video games and stuff. It is fun. Sometimes.
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This is far from confirmation, but initial videos of the interface have always pointed out that the top strip of icons is "the" list of things that can be run alongside games. Nothing about the other apps down below being able to run like that.
Well, that's certainly not the only reason, but it's the most palatable one to the press / general public.
3DS FC: 0817-3759-2788
I assumed he was asking if Nintendo or developers could add more of those type of apps in the future. I saw the Kotaku video about the interface.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/
I write about video games and stuff. It is fun. Sometimes.
Yeah, worst excuse ever... the whole region lock thing is probably the only reason I will not buy one straight away.
Living in Germany I'd still have to import stuff from the UK anyway for English language versions and then have the additional restriction and hassle of not being able to play any US or Japan only releases.
Well, that's what I was wondering. Since the Web Browser application isn't going to be included from the start, I thought it might be a thing that downloadable apps can do. Like you could customize those four spots or something. I dunno.
It would be neat.
Another reason being that a company doesn't want to spend a lot of money localizing a game for Europe only to have crap sales because everyone just imported it during the time it took to translate everything.
It does, but I know I would totally take 60 FPS over any 3-D poppery in a heartbeat. In an instance like how SSFIV has that crazy novel Dynamic View mode, I might be more inclined to try the 3-D more, but in the few minutes I got to try DoA, I thought the silky-smooth FPS was well worth sacrificing the 3-D. Horses for courses and all.
I probably would too, in a fighting game at least, which is why I think it's such a shitty thing for them to do.
"Here, you can either have 3D graphics on your new 3D handheld... or a good frame rate"
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Other than weeaboos being upset because they can't listen to J-pop while practicing their Japanese in some niche dating sim or dance rhythm game crammed with annoying anime trappings or people in Europe or Australia wanting to import and save some money (which is actually pretty valid and I do empathize there), I don't see any major blows being dealt.
Yea, I don't get why Nintendo is making the statements that it'll have more battery life in 2D. The CPU and GPU utilization won't be any less (at least in games that improve framerate in 2D mode).
Personally I think it's likely that the non-technical people at Nintendo might not even know the difference, not the first time I've seen people misunderstanding this technology.
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